From left, Maggie Grace, Cole Heppell and Tom Welling in the horror film 'The Fog'. - CONTRIBUTED
(REUTERS):
A REMAKE of John Carpenter horror film The Fog spooked its way to the top of the North American box office, grossing US$12.2 million its first weekend in theatres, according to studio estimates issued yesterday.
Columbia Pictures' low-budget update of the 1980 chiller knocked last weekend's number one film, clay-animation adventure Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit, to second place with ticket sales of US$11.7 million.
The Fog, which Columbia says cost a relatively modest $18 million to make, stars Tom Welling, Maggie Grace and Selma Blair in the story of a small coastal town terrorised by a malevolent mist and vengeful ghosts from a 100-year-old shipwreck.
Carpenter, who wrote and directed the original Fog, shares producer credits on the remake, which beat out two other movies opening in wide release this weekend.
Filmmaker Cameron Crowe's latest offering, Elizabethtown, a romantic comedy starring Orlando Bloom and Kirsten Dunst, grossed US$11 million to debut at number three. Domino, an R-rated action flick starring Keira Knightley as a bounty hunter, landed at number six with US$4.7 million.
The Jodie Foster thriller Flightplan fell two notches to fourth place in its fourth weekend of wide release, grossing US$6.5 million to bring its cumulative tally to nearly US$70.8 million.
Rounding out this week's top five films was In Her Shoes, a story of sisterly rivalry from director Curtis Hanson, which slipped from number three in its second weekend on ticket sales of US$6.1 million. That brought its total haul to US$20 million.
Overall, box office business from Friday through yesterday was down more than 18 per cent from the same weekend in 2004, marking the third straight weekend of year-to-year declines, according to Exhibitor Relations.
